--- title: Study: Honey Bees Understand Math, Adding and Subtracting description: A new study found that bees can do math, suggesting that advanced arithmetic may be more accessible to nonhumans than previously suspected canonical: https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/ author: Casey Quackenbush article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-02-07T04:47:24.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T22:42:24.266Z article:section: Science og:title: Honey Bees Understand Math, a New Study Says og:description: Scientists say they can add and subtract og:url: https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf8678ec59894dc7f/698944ba4ee2622e61313f5b/gettyimages-687133838.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: Insects og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Honey Bees Understand Math, a New Study Says twitter:description: Scientists say they can add and subtract twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf8678ec59894dc7f/698944ba4ee2622e61313f5b/gettyimages-687133838.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Among the Many Talents of the Humble Honey Bee: Arithmetic > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. by [Casey Quackenbush](https://time.com/author/casey-quackenbush/) ## Casey Quackenbush Feb 7, 2019 4:47 AM UTC  A honey bee in Southern California. A honey bee in Southern California. Ron Reznick—UIG/Getty Images by [Casey Quackenbush](https://time.com/author/casey-quackenbush/) ## Casey Quackenbush Feb 7, 2019 4:47 AM UTC Honey bees are capable of understanding [complex arithmetic](http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/2/eaav0961), according to a new study published Wednesday. Scientists discovered that bees can “learn to use blue and yellow as symbolic representations for addition or subtraction,” according to the report published in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances. While many animals demonstrate an understanding of basic numbers for tasks such as foraging, shoaling, and resource management, more complex math can be done only by a limited number of nonhuman vertebrates. The findings are significant because honey bees and humans are separated by more than 400 million years of evolution, meaning that “advanced numerical cognition may be more accessible to nonhuman animals than previously suspected,” the study found. Scientists created an experiment using mazes to test whether 14 bees could use yellow and blue to add and subtract. The study found that the bees got the right answer 63% to 72% of the time. While the testing pool was small, the findings are significant given that brains of bees are 20,000 times smaller than those of humans. According to Science magazine, this could [lead](https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/02/bees-get-addition-and-subtraction-new-study-suggests?r3f%5F986=https://www.google.com/) to new approaches to artificial intelligence and machine learning. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/"},"headline":"Among the Many Talents of the Humble Honey Bee: Arithmetic","datePublished":"2019-02-07T04:47:24.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T22:42:24.266Z","description":"Scientists say they can add and subtract","url":"https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/","keywords":["animals","onetime","overnight"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf8678ec59894dc7f/698944ba4ee2622e61313f5b/gettyimages-687133838.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Casey Quackenbush","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/casey-quackenbush/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf8678ec59894dc7f/698944ba4ee2622e61313f5b/gettyimages-687133838.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Insects","caption":"Insects","creditText":"Ron Reznick—UIG/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/animals/","name":"animals"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5523603/honey-bees-can-do-math/","name":"Among the Many Talents of the Humble Honey Bee: Arithmetic"}}]}] ```